1960’s ERA FRENCH FOREIGN LEGION 13TH DEMI BRIGADE LAPEL BADGE TAG

Offered is an original 1960's era French Foreign Legion, 13th Demi Brigade lapel pocket badge. Green leather tab, with gilt finished, enamelled badge, showing pin & maker DFSI Paris to rear. Back of tab pen marked Boka Jeno. Tab measures 75mm high. Excellent condition overall.

13e Demi-Brigade de Légion Étrangère, 13e DBLE. The only demi-brigade (half-brigade) of the Foreign Legion and the only demi-brigade within the current French Army. Since June 2016, the 13e DBLE has been stationed at Camp Larzac, located near La Cavalerie in the Aveyron department, southern France.

From August 2011 to June 2016, the 13e DBLE was placed at a desert training camp located at the Zayed Military City, close to Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates (UAE). From 1962 to June 2011, the 13e DBLE was stationed at Quartier général Monclar in Djibouti, Africa, as the last Foreign Legion unit permanently based on this continent.

The unit was formed with legionnaires from Sidi Bel Abbes (Algeria) and Fez (Morocco) in February 1940. Being composed of only two battalions, it was designated as the demi-brigade. Because of the existence of another two provisional units formed in previous months, 11e REI and 12e REI, the new unit got the number 13. The half-brigade was organized as a mountain warfare unit determined to fight in Finland (later, it was changed to Norway).

The 13e DBLE served during WWII in several campaigns (in Norway, in Senegal, Eritrea, Syria, Libya, Egypt, Tunisia, Italy or France). After WWII, it participated in the First Indochina War (1946-54) and the Algerian War (1955-62). From 1963 to 2016, the 13e DBLE was also involved in operations in Djibouti, Somalia, Rwanda, Yemen, Ivory Coast, Indonesia, the Central African Republic, Jordan or Iraq.